Page:Letters from Abroad to Kindred at Home (Volume 1).djvu/97

94 genuine; not at all that of the great man trying to play child. You quite forget, in the freedom and ease of the social man, that he is ever the hero in armour. We met Sidney Smith at his house, the best known of all the wits of the civilized world. The company was small; he was in the vein, which is like a anger bang in voice, and we saw him, I believe, to advantage. His wit was not, as I expected, a succession of brilliant explosions, but a sparkling stream of humour, very like —— when he is at home, and i' the vein too; and, like him also, he seemed to enjoy his own fun, and to have fattened on it.

He expressed unqualified admiration of Dickens, and said that 10,000 of each number of Nicholas Nickleby was sold. There was a young man present, who, being flushed with some recent literary success, ventured to throw himself into the arena against this old lion-king, and, to a lover of such sport, it would have been pleasant to see how he crackled him up, flesh, bones, and all.

concert at L—— house was in a superb gallery of sculpture, with a carved and gilded ceiling, and other appropriate and splendid accompaniments. I am told that it is one of the choicest collection of